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Mission grows to meet needs of homeless fathersTom QuimbyTHE NEWS HERALDThe director of the Panama City Rescue Mission says he is seeing morehomeless men with children there than inyears past. So much so, that he opened a family room to accommodate them.Until two weeks ago, the Allen Avenue mission had a dorm only for children and their mothers. Mission director Thurman Chambers said requests for a shelter for single, homeless men and their children prompted him to make a change.We’d get calls from churches,” Chambers said. We had one man and he had a toddler and there was nothing we could do about it.”A library in the mission's main building was transformed into a family room with two beds, a crib and a dresser. The room can accommodate men and their children, women with older childrenand others who require lodging separate from communal quarters.Chambers, who has been at the shelter since December, said most children who come there do so with their mothers. But times are changing.“We’re seeing more men with kids than we have in the past,” he said. It’s a particular group that’s growing.”The family room measures about 10-by-10, has worn walls and a bare floor.Landmark Holiday Beach Resort donated some furniture, and Chambers hopes a group will come forward to decorate the room.The family room already has been occupied.“One man came with his baby and stayed a night,” said Harold Brown, a desk clerk at the mission.“An older couple stayed there for a hmm Hmu pi™., Ban...while, too, said ltd C ashman, a cashier Because more homeless men are in need of a separate bedroom to care for smallchildren, Panama City Rescue Mission director Thurman Chambers has made thisSee MISSION page 48 new family room at the mission.
Newspaper Details
Panama City News Herald
Panama City, Florida, US
Thu, Oct 10, 2002
Page 9
Full Page
Clipped by
Chastity W.
AL, USA 21 Mar 2022
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